Friday, January 04, 2008

Despite the fact that I lived in Houston, Texas for about 5 years (during 8th grade & high school), if you asked me to give you a description of what the city offers, you'd think I never lived there. Houston, which is rapidly becoming the 3rd largest city in the U.S., is huge and is comprised of what seems to be thousands upon thousands of miles of highways, biways and overpasses. As a high schooler, I didn't get my driver's license until 12th grade which meant that I really didn't explore the city very much. One place I did go, though, which has always been a favorite place to visit while in Houston is the Menil Museum, pictured above. The Menil, designed by Italian architect Renzo Piano, opened in 1987 and houses the amazing collection of John and Dominique de Menil. The de Menils started collecting art in the 1940's. Today, the museum houses over 10,000 pieces of art including paintings, sculpture, prints, drawings and photography.

Although the Menil has an extensive contemporary art collection, the main reason I enjoy going is because of the amazing Surrealist collection that's there. I'll never forget my first trip when I saw a Salvador Dalí painting - it blew me away! My husband loves Dalí's work so I was really excited to take him to the Menil so he could see them. Unfortunately, the Dalí pieces were either on loan or in storage when we went this time - but, to our delight, many pieces by René Magritte were on display including the above piece, entitled "La Trahison des Images" ("The Treachery of Images"). If you're ever in Houston, be sure to stop by the Menil Museum. It's definitely worth the trip!

1 comment:

hey Maura! happy new year to you! i feel the same way about st. louis--i never really explored it when i lived there (except the art museum), so it's actually fun to do that now. i love dali, too. i'll have to check out this museum if i'm ever there... one funny thing. in highschool art class, there was this friend who was dating this guy "in college" who was sooo into dali and magritte. who would it turn out to be? e sterzel. hehe. so i guess you could say he introduced me to dali.